


My Friend, We're Alive

by myrmidryad



Category: Young Avengers
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Nightmares, mentions of torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-11-18
Updated: 2012-11-18
Packaged: 2017-11-19 00:35:28
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,764
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/567056
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/myrmidryad/pseuds/myrmidryad
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Billy has a nightmare about the events in Civil War, when the Warden trapped him and Teddy in the Cube.</p>
            </blockquote>





	My Friend, We're Alive

**Author's Note:**

> So I mainlined all the Young Avengers I could get my hands on in two days of pretty much solid reading, and this wouldn't let go of my brain. 
> 
> Title is from the lyrics of [We're Alive](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wUcwOQHTZak) by My Name Is You.

Teddy doesn’t know what woke him up at first. He blinks several times in the darkness, trying to figure out what’s going on. It’s the slight movement of the sheets that makes him roll over to face Billy, and that’s when he realises what the movement is – the sheets are shaking because Billy’s shaking. And Billy’s definitely not awake. 

It’s not like they’ve never had nightmares before. Teddy’s sure that every superhero must wake up with their heart racing every now and then, because the things they have to go through to be superheroes aren’t exactly the easiest. They’ve all seen some pretty messed-up things, and done some pretty messed-up things too, come to that. So it’s not like Teddy’s a complete stranger to Billy waking him up because he had a nightmare, and it’s not like he’s never done the same himself either. But usually, Billy doesn’t need to wake him up, because Billy’s nightmares tend to make him thrash around, kicking the sheets away and getting Teddy’s attention pretty fast. Occasionally they set off his magic too, and Teddy wakes up to see every object in the room that wasn’t nailed down floating a foot or so away from their surfaces. 

This is different. Billy’s shudders are tight, his whole body tense and hunched over. His face is tilted to the ceiling, and Teddy’s stomach lurches horribly when he sees tear tracks shining at the corners of his eyes. Billy’s mouthing something, he sees, but he can’t tell exactly what it is. He thinks it’s one of Billy’s spells – it looks repetitive, whatever he’s saying, but he can’t lipread in the dark. 

Whatever Billy’s dreaming, it can’t be pleasant. Teddy knows from experience that he won’t be able to wake Billy up, but it kills him to see his boyfriend like this, literally shaking in phantom pain. One of the tear tracks glistens as fresh moisture moves down it, the trail going to the hollow of Billy’s ear. Teddy sits up and wishes desperately that there was something he could do other than wait for Billy to wake up, but there isn’t. The last time he’d tried to shake Billy awake, Billy’s magic had thrown him across the room, and that had made Billy feel even worse. It was better to just be ready for when he regained consciousness. That didn’t make _Teddy_ feel any better about it. 

It’s only a couple of minutes till Billy’s eyes fly open and he gasps, his body spasming, but it feels like much longer to Teddy. Billy doesn’t see him immediately, but struggles instead to get out from under the sheets. Teddy helps to pull them away, and only then do Billy’s eyes find him in the gloom. 

“ _Teddy_ –” 

Billy practically launches himself at him, but it’s only when his hand finds Teddy’s stomach and presses hard against it that Teddy realises what this particular nightmare must have been about. He swallows down his own memories and hugs Billy close, pulling him into his lap and pressing kisses against his hairline. “It’s okay,” he whispers, “it was just a nightmare. You’re okay now.” 

Billy shakes again and presses his forehead into Teddy’s shoulder. “ _You’re_ okay,” he croaks, “God, Teddy, I dreamed –” he takes his hand away from Teddy’s stomach and wraps his arms around Teddy’s back instead, pulling himself as close as he can get. “ _Fuck_.” 

There’s not much Teddy can do except make soothing noises and rub Billy’s back, feeling his spine tremble under his palm. They’re both silent for a long time, until Billy stops shivering and draws back enough to cup Teddy’s face and kiss him. 

“Are you okay?” Teddy asks, pressing their foreheads together and waiting for Billy to look at him. 

“Better,” Billy says finally, “what time is it?” 

Teddy cranes his head to look at the alarm clock. “Uh…three twenty-nine.” 

Billy sighs and presses his cheek to Teddy’s. “Okay. Okay.” 

“Back to sleep?” Teddy asks. He’ll get up now if Billy wants him to, but he doesn’t need to say that. Billy knows. 

Billy nods. “Yeah. Can you –?” 

“Yeah,” Teddy kisses the corner of his mouth, “come on.” He manoeuvres them back down and pulls Billy’s back flush against his chest, draping his arm over Billy’s arm and side. He’d hate to sleep like this in Billy’s position, but Billy likes to be surrounded sometimes. Held in, safe. And Teddy likes holding Billy close like this, so it works out. Billy’s the smaller of the two of them, but he’s not exactly titchy, so Teddy shifts slightly to become a little bigger, broadening his shoulders so he can curl up and around Billy a little. Billy pushes back into his chest and grabs his wrist, holding him in place. 

Teddy falls asleep after a while, nose almost touching the back of Billy’s neck, but Billy stays awake. He won’t get back to sleep for an hour or so at least, he thinks, but it’s not early enough to justify getting up. He likes being like this anyway, with Teddy’s heat containing him, Teddy’s bulk holding him and leaning against him, Teddy’s breathing reassuring against the back of his neck. 

Teddy’s alive. Teddy’s okay. Everything’s fine. They’re safe. 

Billy shivers despite himself, and pulls Teddy’s arm against his chest a little tighter. He hasn’t told anyone except Teddy what it was like, trapped in the Cube with the Warden. Karolina knows, of course. She was awake for the whole thing. She must’ve seen the Warden put the weird audio dampeners in Billy’s ears, and she saw the Warden experiment with different types of knife and saw and scalpel on Teddy. 

Teddy was unconscious the whole time. He told Billy that he didn’t really remember anything – just the pain from the cuts that hadn’t healed yet when he woke up. Teddy’s just lucky like that. There had been pain when Billy woke up as well, in his ears. That had been the first sensation as he regained consciousness – three sharp pains in each ear where the Warden had shoved those spikes through the flesh. 

Panic had been the next feeling, when he’d realised he was restrained, held firmly in place and unable to move an inch. And the position he had been restrained in…Billy hates being vulnerable, hates feeling weak, and having his arms pulled open like that, his legs spread wide, his head held in a vice that kept it pushed forward at a horribly uncomfortable angle…that was a nightmare all by itself. 

Add in the horror of being unable to hear his own voice and the sight of Teddy being tortured, and it was like the Warden had reached into his brain and created Billy’s own personal hell. 

Billy had screamed at first, and when nothing had happened, he’d freaked out, because he could still hear other things, like Karolina struggling against her restraints, and the low hum of machinery in the walls. The Warden had come in then, like he’d been waiting for Billy to wake up (he probably had, because he was a sick bastard like that), and come over to poke Billy in the chest with a grin. 

“Don’t bother,” he’d sung, snorting with amusement, “you’re useless now.” 

Billy had screamed again, something like, “Let him go!” and regretted it immediately when the Warden just grinned again and went over to Teddy, still thankfully unconscious. 

“I’m afraid I’m far too fond of my new toys to give them up so fast,” he’d chuckled, and Billy’s stomach had lurched, because _toys?_ “I haven’t even had a chance to play with the most interesting one yet,” he’d turned away, and Billy had only then seen the medical table covered in various blades. 

He’d tried to use his magic, he’d tried so hard – he doesn't know why not being able to hear himself makes such a big difference, but apparently it does. He’d recited his desire for the Warden to stop until his throat was raw, but it hadn’t made any difference. He’d tried not to watch, but he could still hear the sick sound of metal moving through flesh, slick and wet, and he’d never felt so helpless in his _life_. He’d begged the Warden to leave Teddy alone, to stop, to dissect him instead, but the Warden had ignored him, and without being able to hear his own voice, Billy wasn’t even sure if he’d said anything at all. 

It’s been months since then. They’ve been through worse. They’ve seen worse, and they know they got lucky that day, getting out of the Cube alive and relatively unharmed. He thought he’d pushed it to the back of his mind, far away enough to stay buried. In daylight, he can’t remember exactly what it was like, not usually, but he remembers now. The nightmare’s brought it all back – the smell of Teddy’s insides, the chill in the room on his bare arms, and the cold sweat against his skin. Karolina’s stifled sobs, Xavin’s body directly opposite her, slumped on the floor against the wall with his neck at that unnatural angle. The drip-drip-drip of Teddy’s blood falling to the floor.  

And the Warden. His constant sick smile, the smell of his lank hair when he came close to taunt him. The precise way he held the surgical knives. The pain that had set into his neck and shoulders after a while, the horrible, horrible inability to move, scream, cast a spell, do _anything_. 

The little details escape him when he’s awake. He doesn’t remember the way his arms and legs had been freezing, but his neck and head had been overheated because of his stupid uniform and all the layers there. He forgets the way he couldn’t look directly at what the Warden was doing to Teddy because he couldn’t move his head at all. He forgets exactly what it feels like to hear everything but his own voice, how disorienting it is. How it had confused his brain and made him doubt his abilities and strength. 

The nightmare caught all those details and more, like the plugholes under each of the restraining areas, to catch the blood and gore. The way the restraints holding Teddy’s waist in place had been stained red before long. The way Billy had squeezed his eyes shut when he heard the first saw start to buzz and concentrate on not crying instead of trying to use his magic. 

The Warden had actually paused to watch him struggle. He’d chuckled as he told Billy that since they weren’t human, they were a legal grey area. He could keep them for as long as he liked. He would keep them until they died. He would turn them into weapons if he could, but if he couldn’t, he’d be content to just play. He’d do it in his down time, he’d said, when he needed to take a break. He’d lock Billy and Teddy in a room like this, and they could watch him as he alternated between the two of them, making them watch as he tortured them. He’d wondered aloud whether Billy’s body would be able to take even a tenth of what he would be able to do to Teddy’s. If Teddy’s body would be able to regrow things, like eyeballs, limbs, sections of brain. How well Billy would be able to concentrate if he could hear Teddy _screaming_. 

The Warden may have used the knives exclusively on Teddy, but he’d tortured them both. Perhaps Billy even more so, because Teddy claimed to have no memory of the procedures at all. So Billy’s the one haunted by the memories of the tiny room in the Cube, the smell of Teddy’s blood, the image of Teddy’s insides parted by bloody steel forever burned into his mind. 

In reality, Xavin had saved them, and their team and the Runaways had rescued them, but in his nightmare, no one had come. Xavin had remained dead, and the Warden just cut and cut and _cut_ away at Teddy until Teddy inevitably woke up, and of course he’d screamed, because having your stomach sliced into again and again would be agony, with or without a healing power, and the Warden had just laughed and laughed and kept cutting until Teddy had hung limp and weak against his restraints while Billy had been unable to do _anything_. 

Because time in dreams is fluid, it seemed as if they had never been rescued. That the war had raged on outside the Cube and no one had come for them. In the nightmare, Xavin’s body had been dragged away, and Karolina had been removed to another room, and the Warden had followed through on all of the promises he made in real life. Every single pain-filled promise designed to hurt as much as possible, and it had all felt as real in his head as if it had actually happened. 

Even though Billy knows they got out, and Teddy is fine, it still feels like the Warden forced him to watch as Teddy died, broken and bloodied and screaming for Billy to save him when Billy hadn’t been able to do anything. Hadn’t even been able to hear himself desperately chanting, over and over, “IwanthimtostopIwanthimtostopIwanthimtostopIwanthimtostoppleasestoppleasestoppleasepleaseGodplease _pleasestop!_ ” 

He’s crying, he realises distantly as something cold trickles into his ear. “I’m okay,” he whispers to himself, pushing back into Teddy’s body to reassure himself that they’re not restrained by metal and leather or held apart on different walls. “I’m okay,” he says again, because hearing his own voice is more of a relief than he would’ve thought possible. “I’m okay, I’m okay,” 

“Billy?” Teddy mumbles, pressing a kiss to the back of his neck. 

He can’t go back to sleep. An hour of reliving the horror isn’t going to help, but he doesn’t want to get Teddy up.  It’s three-thirty in the morning, for God’s sakes. No one should be up right now, least of all two guys who have to balance sleep with superhero work, school, and family commitments. 

“I’m fine,” he whispers, and apparently he’s a terrible liar when he’s still shaken from a nightmare, because Teddy moves and shrinks back to his normal size, and taps Billy’s shoulder till Billy looks at him. 

“You’re not fine,” Teddy says seriously, sitting up. “And you can’t get back to sleep, can you?” 

Billy sits up as well, and his expression must say it all, because Teddy shuffles forward to bring him into another gloriously warm hug. 

“You’re safe,” Billy mutters against Teddy’s shoulder, “we’re safe, we’re fine, and _I’m_ fine.” 

“Yeah, I’m calling bullshit on that one,” Teddy says softly, and pulls back to get out of bed, picking up a t-shirt from the floor to yank over his head. “Come on.” 

“Where?” Billy’s body is exhausted, but his mind is _horribly_ awake. 

“Downstairs, dork,” Teddy comes around to his side and holds out his hand to help Billy up. “You bring a blanket, I’ll make some coffee or hot chocolate or something.” 

“Yeah?” Billy squeezes his eyes shut for a moment as Teddy flicks the lights on, and when he opens them, Teddy’s right there in front of him, hair still rumpled from sleep. 

“Yeah,” he says gently, stroking a hand through Billy’s hair. “C’mon – blanket. Bring it downstairs, I’ll meet you there.” 

When he comes downstairs, Teddy’s in the kitchen. “Couch,” he says over his shoulder, “I’ll be there in a sec.” 

He comes in a minute or so later, carrying two steaming mugs. Billy can tell by the smell that he went with the hot chocolate option. Teddy puts an arm around him when he sits down, and Billy curls into him with a sigh. “I’m sorry.” 

“Don’t be dumb,” Teddy says easily, “you’ve gotten up for my nightmares before. It’s no big deal, B.” 

Billy is so, so grateful to have Teddy in his life. He shifts around to get a better angle and then kisses him, slowly, burying one hand in Teddy’s blonde mop and resting the other on his stomach. His perfectly fine, unscarred stomach. Teddy’s alive. Teddy’s okay, and that means he is too. “I love you,” he whispers against Teddy’s lips when they draw apart. “You know that, right?” 

Teddy smiles and kisses his lips, then his cheek, his temple, his eyelid. “I know,” he whispers against Billy’s jawline. “I love you too.” 

They both have nightmares, and the nightmares are awful, but it’s okay, because when they wake up, they’ll take care of each other. It’s okay. It’s okay.

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed this, please consider [buying me a coffee!](https://ko-fi.com/A221HQ9) <3


End file.
